A Never Ending Story
by Cassian Green
Summary: It was a nice day and Sakura noticed that the book's pages were a lot like leaves. Drabble.


Sakura glanced down reading the faded words out of an old book she held gently in her hands. The pages, she noticed, were much like crumpled up leaves on an autumn day, crisp and delicate. The sun shone brightly through her large windows even though she had half of the curtains drawn. Her head slowly turned, looking out the window as a pair of ANBU flashed by, nothing more than a black and gray blur. Looking back at her book, one of the dozens she picked up from the library yesterday, she fingered a page before turning it quietly. The small rustle of the page was the only noise to echo throughout her room. She was given a special privilege of being able to take as many books as she needed, at any time she wanted, some even from restricted areas of the library, due to the fact she was now Tsunade's apprentice. It was quite handy too, as she was an avid reader of anything from books, to newspapers, to candy wrappers since she was kid. Her mind would slowly, but surely remember almost any given fact she had read if certain questions were asked.

_"When did so and so company stop doing business," a random passer buyer would ask. _

_ "When so and so happened," would be her quick response, as the small amount of random data slipped its way into her mind. _

It was something she was quite proud of herself. The few neighbors that she knew sometimes stopped by to ask her for information and she managed to gain a small friendship with the grumpy old man who ran an ice cream cart that would pass by everyday at noon. It was a routine for her walk out her house and call out to him in an attempt to play a sort of "gambling game" they came up with. He'd ask a trivia question and if she answered correctly he'd give her a small popsicle. If she answered wrong, which she hadn't done since she was eleven, she'd buy two popsicles from him every day for the next week. It brought her some temporary joy, winning that popsicle, but it was only momentary as she was soon holding herself up in her room pouring over the dozens of books she brought home.

Without so much as looking up from her book Sakura lifted a small cup of green tea off her desk and took a small sip before settling it back on to its previous spot next to a picture of her mother and father.

_Twitch._

Sakura's hand stalled for a brief second as the cup tapped against her desk, remembering where and exactly what the cup was placed next to and she stared solemnly at the picture. It had been what, four, no five years since that picture was taken. Slipping her hand behind the picture, she lifted it up to take a closer look. She scanned the picture quietly as time seemed to slow down. Her father's chocolate brown hair and sharp green eyes stood out against his worn out clothes and her mother's flowing pink hair danced about her face falling just short of her shoulders. Where were they, she wondered. It had been years since they last took a picture like this together and she questioned what had happened to the time from then to now. Where had it gone? Did it get lost in the flow of life or was it just shoved into an old shoe box to collect dust in the back of the hall closet? For now, all she knew was that they were, yet again, gone for business trip to who knows where and who knows when they'd be back. It had always been like that since she turned about seven or eight. They began to go off on trips, sometimes setting up a long time baby sitter for the random occasion where they'd be gone for a month or so. They'd return after what seemed to be a millennium and toss her a few gifts only to slip out the door and be replaced with the elderly woman from next door or a hired genin on a D-Rank mission.

_Nip._

Sakura flinched as she felt a copper taste drip gently into her mouth. She gently rolled her tongue across her lip feeling a small tear in her lip and she frowned. Her bad habit of biting her lip kicked in and she hadn't realized it. Chucking the picture back on her desk in frustration Sakura picked up the lone book and took a sip of tea attempting to relax once again in her chair.

As the day went on and the sun continued to shine happily on the oblivious citizens of Konoha, Sakura placed her tea on her desk and turned another page.

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><p><strong>AN:** Hey there! Thanks for reading! You might have some questions as to why I wrote this. Well, I always saw Sakura as a lonely kid, like Sasuke and Naruto, even though she came off as a typical, in-love, some what flirty teenage girl. Not because she had some tragic past that haunted her, but because she was bullied as a child and I always felt that maybe her parents weren't all that there for her leading her to be somewhat reclusive and lonesome when she wasn't with her friends. She's a girl who'd rather spend a day inside just reading books rather than having to go out and deal with the world sometimes.


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